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ForgeRock vs Symantec Privileged Access Manager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

ForgeRock
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
30
Ranking in other categories
Identity Management (IM) (14th), Access Management (12th), Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) (7th)
Symantec Privileged Access ...
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
53
Ranking in other categories
Privileged Access Management (PAM) (16th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Identity and Access Management solutions, they serve different purposes. ForgeRock is designed for Access Management and holds a mindshare of 6.8%, up 5.6% compared to last year.
Symantec Privileged Access Manager, on the other hand, focuses on Privileged Access Management (PAM), holds 1.4% mindshare, down 1.6% since last year.
Access Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
ForgeRock6.8%
Microsoft Entra ID24.0%
Auth08.4%
Other60.8%
Access Management
Privileged Access Management (PAM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Symantec Privileged Access Manager1.4%
CyberArk Privileged Access Manager15.8%
WALLIX Bastion7.2%
Other75.6%
Privileged Access Management (PAM)
 

Featured Reviews

Ahmet Murat Ülker - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use, but customizations can be complicated to handle
I would suggest others use the product after asking them to consider their use cases. SSO may be a use case for some, and using the product as an IDM tool may be a use case. At the moment, my company is not deploying all the components of ForgeRock itself. My company uses ForgeRock for OAuth 2.0. For example, my company is not deploying the IDM and identity gateway components. You should consider your use case and select the required components for that use case. My company does not use the SSO features of the tool. My company uses SSO to access ForgeRock's AM Console for individual users. My company does not use single sign on features of the product and instead, we use Auth0. I rate the tool a seven or eight out of ten.
Muzi Lubisi - PeerSpot reviewer
Secure management of sensitive servers and seamless applications with direct linking
The credential injection feature is highly valued, particularly for RDP sessions. A majority of customers use it for RDP, and a couple for Linux servers. The broader capabilities, including access to multiple systems, web-based applications, and clustering, have never posed an issue. The threat analytics aspect is also a robust feature that analyzes all pertinent information.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Easy to customize and adaptable to any environment."
"We create and define the permissions and configurations for the users."
"We used it to implement multi-factor authentication and to improve our security posture as well as reducing the potential for attacks."
"This is a stable solution. When you do experience any issues, you will see it in your DB logs or audit logs so you can easily reach a conclusion of might be causing it."
"The product is easy to set up."
"ForgeRock is an extensive product with many functionalities and capabilities, much more than many other tools combined."
"Easy to navigate, handle and manage the applications."
"I like the intelligent authentication feature."
"Comprehensive coverage of the required features for the PAM solution."
"We know we can scale up with what we have, and we probably will not need to buy any further appliances down the road."
"We found that the architecture is scalable and very resilient."
"You can do A2A integration. You can have your own script, which can then run outside of PA to retrieve the password and perform other tasks."
"Stability is solid as a rock."
"It will provide us with more security."
"Password Management and Session Recording. The simplicity and ease that it is to be up and running out-of-the-box is very much appreciated."
"Symantec PAM is easier to deploy compared to its competitors, such as BeyondTrust."
 

Cons

"The user interface could be improved as it is cumbersome and outdated. It doesn't have a responsive UI."
"They should improve the solution by include reporting."
"We're worried about the scaling. We're told it will be okay and there won't be issues, however, I'm not 100% convinced."
"We would like this solution to be developed for use with mobile applications."
"I don't think ForgeRock directly supports integrations with Slack, making it an area where improvements are required."
"I find that it's quite expensive for just an open-source system. Support is quite expensive."
"The product's customization is a bit complicated."
"The only problem with ForgeRock is that it is derived from an open-source product, so sometimes it's a bit unstable."
"An improvement for this solution is that it should not be constantly based on user name and password. There should be a condition to edit and update your username."
"Recent releases need improvement in webpage management. For instance, navigating through a webpage that acts like a wizard, where I proceed to the next page and enter more information, is not handled well by the system."
"They need to do a little bit more on the mainframe side.​"
"Recent releases need improvement in webpage management."
"The service account management functionality needs to be extended to application pools, SQL database, PowerShell scripts, service account discovery, etc."
"It'd be great if you just stuck in your PIV card and Windows popped up, asked you for your password. You typed it in, then it remembered your credentials."
"I would like this solution to be simpler. It should have a one-click access that works together with AWS."
"The management console could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of the solution is fair but I do not have the full details."
"ForgeRock's pricing is more competitive than other products."
"It's a bit pricey and could be more competitive."
"Its price is comparable to other products in the market."
"The license is purchased annually per user. However, you can negotiate if you are signing for a longer period of time. When comparing this solution to others on the market it is priced fair, it is not at the top of the price range or at the bottom end."
"ForgeRock is an expensive solution."
"Its licensing is on a yearly basis, but it also depends on the contract that you have with the vendor. They have multiple types of contracts. There are additional costs to the standard licensing fees. If you need some of the features, you have to pay more."
"We have multiple clients we are looking at right now. We are at a very small number, however, the idea and the goal is to grow. We are looking at about $100,000 and $50,000 a minimum a month cost. That'd be minimum maybe in a couple of years."
"The version we are using is affordable compared to BeyondTrust, which is maybe three to four times as expensive, but it depends on the features."
"They offer per-device, per-user, or monthly and yearly licensing models."
"Cost-wise, CA was better compared to others in the market. ​"
"It is reasonably priced."
"Pricing is fair compared to other top vendors."
"The prices are not low, but one can ask for a discount. It’s not the cheapest PAM solution."
"Appliances are relatively cheap, don’t skimp. Make sure you have redundancy, high availability, and enough appliances to manage the concurrent workload."
"I would prefer better licensing options for the 20-100 users we have at a given time."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
23%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Insurance Company
6%
Comms Service Provider
17%
Computer Software Company
16%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise13
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise30
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about ForgeRock?
The most valuable features of ForgeRock are social login and data protection.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ForgeRock?
Our company was considering switching back to Keycloak from ForgeRock, so as to not pay any license fees. ForgeRock also supports M-PIN and biometric features that Keycloak does not provide. My com...
What needs improvement with ForgeRock?
In the past, I saw that Splunk was integrated with a testing portal, and then it was integrated with Slack. I don't think ForgeRock directly supports integrations with Slack, making it an area wher...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Symantec Privileged Access Manager?
Due to the nature of the solution, it is hard to gauge, but compared to competitors, the pricing is very good. I would rate it as an eight and a half out of ten.
What needs improvement with Symantec Privileged Access Manager?
Recent releases need improvement in webpage management. For instance, navigating through a webpage that acts like a wizard, where I proceed to the next page and enter more information, is not handl...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Privileged Access Manager?
With the customers that I have so far, I help them broker RDP sessions to sensitive servers, particularly those that manage aspects like physical access. I have also done it for backend databases, ...
 

Also Known As

ForgeRock Identity Platform, ForgeRock OpenIDM
CA PAM, Xceedium Xsuite, CA Privileged Access Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Geico, Thomson Reuters, Salesforce, McKesson, Trinet, SKY, BNP Paribas, Deloitte, Capgemini, North Western University
NEOVERA, Telesis, eSoft
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